by Garion Swann
Path to Europa
Garion Swann
Thank you so much for purchasing Path to Europa, this is my first self-published ebook.
Thank you to my proofreaders, spell checkers, does-it-even-make-sense checkers and those who I ask completely random questions to that probably made no sense.
Emily Bourne, Dave Swann & Craig Garrett
Feedback & constructive criticism is always welcome, please feel free to leave a review or contact me on my website.
www.garionswann.co.uk
Prologue
131 A.S.F (3151 A.D)
In the depths of endless space, there is a never-ending conflict, a conflict which has seen countless lives lost all over inhabited space, a conflict between life and death. In most cases it would be a quick death, with just enough time to realise what was going on before it was over. One small hole in the hull, one undetected mine from the countless wars that have decimated the galaxy over hundreds of years, or merely a rogue pirate that woke up and decided they were going to destroy something today. These were the thoughts that overwhelmed Captain Alex Harper's mind while his lifeless vessel drifted without power through the darkness. The chill that could be felt down to the bone was the cold lifelessness of space. The life support was beginning to fail, and the last hints of power were dwindling. Fifty-six people crowded the bridge of his ship, and they were all deadly quiet, not enough energy to talk, move or even weep. The realisation of death was a strange feeling, it was not what Alex had expected. He thought there would be panicking, distress and more pain, but it was oddly peaceful. The silence of a powerless ship and a helpless crew was like the peace he'd always sought after. Alex thought back over the decisions he had made to end up in this situation. He had never been a risk taker, he stuck with a steady job aboard the huge colony station of Europa, an impressive structure built as the ring of a planet. Europa has a population of just over one billion people, and could also host hundreds of thousands of ships at any one time. Europa was one of the jewels of the Empire-that-was, after the fall of the Empire several factions fought for control of Europa, and it's fleets. Many attempted to take the station by force, but it was just too big, and Europa defended itself well. Eventually, two factions emerged with Europa on the border between the two. The United Planets and Hintari Collective had a short war but soon decided it was pointless. Europa did not want to be fought over they wanted to be independent. During the signing of the Earth Memorial Agreement, Europa chose to place themselves within the United Planets. The agreement between two was that Europa still maintained control of its own fleets and various other militaries. Alex, like most of the crew, was born and raised on Europa and worked in Commerce. Rising to Commerce Manager for Sub-Section 3-47 he spent a few years there until he rose once more and became one of six Senior Commerce Managers for Europa, he was put in charge of section three, which meant he had the responsibilities of fifty sub-sections and their commerce managers. Having the responsibility of several thousand people working underneath him meant that he was paid well. Eventually, he decided to buy his own ship, he purchased a used in system trading vessel, he was not a risk taker and decided that staying in the Europa system was the best idea. He had it all planned out, a simple life trading, making money, eventually selling the ship and retiring early to the delights of section one of Europa. Where he went wrong was deciding to take a risk, money was coming in but not very fast, he found some months he made a small loss and decided he needed to earn more and spent a large chunk of his money on a jump drive. He accepted a long-range trading mission, the mission was successful, but the ship was not designed to make long journeys, his engineer, Grey, managed to keep the ship going with constant warnings that it could all go wrong any minute, and it did. This is how they ended up in their current situation.
Alex was snapped back to reality when the ship rocked violently, the sound of metal screeching overwhelmed his ears. It lasted a few seconds, and the silence returned.
"What the hell is that?" Came the voice of Jenny Glover, still sat at her helms console, seeing such a strong woman weakened was one of the scariest parts of their impending doom, there was no one on the ship that wanted to cross Jenny, a superb pilot and a highly trained foot soldier.
"We are unable to see, there's no power to the sensors," replied Grant McDonald, chief of ship's operations, some people just called him a glorified admin, but the logistics of his job confused even Alex, he was also a technology genius.
"Well done jackass, congratulations on your promotion to Captain Obvious!" Alex sighed weakly when he heard the voice of his grumpy old First Mate Dylan Roper, he always had something aggressive to say.
"Just so people know, we have windows, please look out of them," Alex said calmly. Some of the crew members stood up and moved towards the windows that were on the bridge, they were small, but they may be able to see what had made the noise.
"There's a ship out there!" One crew member said the hope in his voice was apparent.
"Can we identify it?" Alex responded.
"There are some markings on the side I don't recognise, oh wait! I can see some words, I think it says Armageddon." Alex mustered all the energy he could and stood up, he walked over to the windows himself, the crewmember who saw the ship moving out of the way. He could see the word ‘Armageddon' on the hull. He could feel a cold dread, he knew this ship from his days on Europa. The sounds of systems coming back online startled a few of the crew, panels and lights started to illuminate once more, the ship buzzed into life as the Armageddon transferred power to its core. The life support began working properly as full power was restored to its systems, the bridge started to heat up again as the environmental systems combated the cold.
"Everyone remain here, lock down the bridge after I have left. I will meet with the crew of the other ship and thank them for rescuing us." Alex ordered in his calmest tone, although inside he just wanted to break down at the thought of what may be to come.
"Lockdown the bridge! Why?" His first mate said in a raised voice.
"Because I ordered it, and you will follow my orders without question, do you understand Mr Roper?" Alex rarely had to put his foot down like this, but there was no time to waste on pointless conversations.
"Aye Captain," came Dylan's response. Dylan was an experienced officer and knew the Captain had his reasons.
Alex left the bridge and heard the thick protective bulkheads moving into place both sides of the doors. His ship didn't have top of the range defence but would take time for anyone to get through that much metal. Alex walked quickly through the small corridors of the ship and made his way to a ladder that would lead him down to the lower decks. The ship had four decks named one through four, deck one was actually at the bottom of the vessel, for some odd reason deck one isn't at the top, this was always a talking point amongst the crew as most ships have deck one at the top. Deck one and two are Cargo Bays, with the aft areas the engineering section. The engineering section spans the aft quarter of decks one, two and three. The remainder of deck three is taken up by facilities for the crew, such as recreational room, clothes wash, the mess and small crew quarters holding four to a room. Deck four had more small crew quarters, some slightly larger quarters to which senior offices had a room each and the Captain's and XO's quarters which were again slightly larger, half of deck three and four also contained storage for water, food and fuel. Alex's quarters had a small living area, a bathroom and a bedroom. He also had a door to his office which then had a door onto the bridge. He could go long periods just staying in this area and not even going into the corridor that was outside his quarters.
As he climbed down to deck two, he checked a status panel to see which docking port the Armageddon had docked against, it was the
port side. He made his way over to the docking port and was happy to see the airlock had not been opened yet. The crew of the Armageddon needed to know straight away that there were people on board. They may have docked thinking the ship was abandoned. From the outside, it would have seemed like a quick and easy prize. He heard the seal complete, and the light above the airlock turned green, meaning that it was safe to open the airlock, he waited for a few minutes to see if there was any movement, there wasn't. He moved forward and looked through the airlock window, he was able to see through to the other ship through its airlock window and glimpsed movement, someone was standing in front of the window he moved back and checked his sidearm, disengaging the safety but leaving it in the holster. The Armageddon's airlock began to open, and he could see figures on the other side, they were pirates. Alex had purposely not told the rest of the crew that the Armageddon was a pirate ship, he knew it was from when he worked on Europa, the Armageddon had been responsible for the loss of many vessels. As soon as the Europan fleet had a whiff of the Armageddon they would go at it in force, only once has there ever been an actual sighting that was recording on sensors, it lasted less than a second and the Armageddon jumped out of the system. Alex watched the pirates as they entered the airlock, and waited for his ship's airlock to open, they could not see in as it was only a one-way window. It was strange, as children growing up on Europa you heard stories of Pirates being people in torn clothes full of skin art and looking rough, tough and always wanting a fight, but these pirates were dressed like an elite military squad with state of the art weaponry, black-clad armour, and what looked like helmets with head up displays inside. He heard the airlock open and put his hands plainly in the air. As the pirates boarded the ship they responded to his presence immediately, he heard one of them speak.
"Live ship, I say again, Live ship!" the first pirate said, talking into a comm.
"On your knees!" Shouted the same person to Alex, he complied and dropped to his knees hands still in the air.
"Search him," ordered the pirate.
Two of the pirates came to either side of Alex and removed his weapon, they rendered it safe first and began to search the rest of him, they found only his comm unit and the figure to his right nodded at the pirate that had first spoke.
They all stood still and did not say anything, Alex wondered if he should say anything but decided against it. He wondered what they were waiting for, orders maybe, or were they playing mind games? He assumed live ship meant it was not abandoned, it made sense, they were probably expecting an empty ship as that is what it would have looked like to the outside.
Without warning the squad of pirates snapped to attention and faced the airlock, Alex looked at the airlock to see a formidable looking woman flanked by two more pirates. The woman wore the same sort of black-clad armour, but it seemed stronger than the rest of the pirates, unlike the others she did not wear a helmet, she had jet black hair with small curls pointing in all directions, she wore a headband to keep it out of her face. When she walked, it seemed like she was the source of all power, a very confident walk, making her way onto his ship as if she owned it.
"Your ship was dead," she said, her voice was just as formidable as she looked, the sort of voice that gives you the chills, it reminded him of his least favourite teacher's voice.
"Nearly dead," Alex began, he fell back when one of the pirates punched him, hard on his face.
"You will stand when you talk." It was said calmly and quietly. Alex got the feeling it would not always be like that.
Alex grimaced in pain and stood up, "Nearly dead, thank you for the rescue," Alex said to the woman.
"Hmm," was all she said.
"I'm Alex Harper, this is the Michelangelo," Alex said leaving the conversation open, hoping the woman would introduce herself, creating a dialogue might actually get them through this.
"Lady Jean, I run things around here, you sound like a Europa boy, what brings you out here to my realm?"
"Not listening to my engineer," Alex replied without much of a thought, he was cursing himself for not stopping for maintenance when he had the chance. Lady Jean chuckled.
"Common issue," she replied, "Well, I do thank you graciously for not listening to your engineer as it has proven most advantageous for me." She continued with a sly smile on her face, "See now, I have two choices, I could kill all that crew of yours behind their nice secure bulkhead on your bridge, and after making you watch me kill all your crew I'll kill you, how does that sound?" She said coming close to him, the seriousness in her eyes was frightening.
"What's the second option?" He asked, trying to remain confident, he was scared, more scared than he's ever been before.
"You owe me, and your debt can be repaid within a day," She said simply, "You see it didn't take me long to run your name through the database I stole from Europa a few years back. Alex Harper, Senior Commerce Manager, my, my this is good." it was clear she had an earpiece that someone was using to feed her information. "You see I have some cargo I need to get through Europa, undetected, and you're going to do it for me." She finished.
"And if I refuse," He replied.
"Why do people always ask that question, it's not the movies you know, I refer you back to option one." She said, back to her cold, frightening stare.
"What's the cargo?" he asked.
"That information need not concern you, we'll tow you back, load you up and send you off again! Ta ta for now!" She said as she turned and walked back to her ship with the same formidable pace she had before. All the soldiers turned to leave and followed behind Lady Jean.
Alex sighed and watched as the airlock seal closed, once they were out of sight he ran as fast as he could to the bridge. Upon arriving, he frantically waved at the hidden camera that would allow the crew inside to know it was him. He watched as the large bulkhead began to retract and enable him to enter the bridge, as soon as he got through he got to work.
"I need a power status, and weapons charged!"
Some of the crew got to work the rest looked on wondering what was going on. Some were just staring at his nose, he had not cleared the blood that covered the lower half of his face.
"Battlestations!" he ordered, then they rushed to their feet, most of them running off the bridge to their various stations aboard the ship, most were engineering crew. The remaining bridge crew took their stations and began getting status updates.
"Power and fuel are topped off Captain, they filled us to the brim," Grant said first, "I can't charge the weapons though I seem to be locked out."
The crew started to hear metallic bangs, something was impacting the hull.
"They're grappling us!" The XO said from his station next to Alex who sighed at the information.
"Any luck with weapons," Alex asked.
"No sir," Grant said.
The bridge crew all jumped as Lady Jean's voice boomed over the comms, "Now now Captain, please don't charge those weapons it won't end well for you," the comms cut and Alex clenched his fist.
"They're going to tow us somewhere and want us, in return for rescuing us, to get some, probably illicit, cargo through the Europa system, she knew I've worked there before and assumed I could get it through Europa,"
"Can you?" asked the XO.
"I reckon so," Alex responded.
They felt the ship start to move as they were being towed, no one onboard knew where they were going, but Alex guessed it was to a small outpost somewhere near the border to the United Planets. He thought it was unlikely they would take a ship like this to the Pirates Den, a name coined by the Europan fleet when trying to hunt down the Pirates, it was believed to be a hidden pirate base, some were not confident that it actually existed.
"Let's just get this out the way, we do one illicit cargo so what, we save our lives!" Dylan said.
"I hate to say it I agree, there's no way out of this," Alex said.
It had been several hours since they started their journey under tow, the shi
p said they were cruising about point nine of the speed of light, the Armageddon would not be able to use its jump-drive while towing so they could be in for a long flight. Alex looked around the bridge and saw his crew working, they were all scared, all they have heard about the captors is that they are pirates, nothing more of what Alex heard during his short conversation with Lady Jean. He didn't want to tell them of the threats that had been made as that could lead to more trouble, the last thing he needed right now was an even more unsettled crew.
"Captain, we're picking something up on sensors, they are jamming us so I can't get a clear picture," Grant said.
"What about the optics?" Alex asked in return.
"I'll give it a shot," Grant said as he moved to a different console. The optics were an antiquated lens system which could be used to view the space around the ship with the eye rather than looking at a sensor readout. Grant put the image up on the main screen. Alex watched as Grant changed the focuses on the optics until there was a clearer picture. Grant increased the optical zoom and on-screen they could see a station, a small station, most likely a rest stop for pirates on their way back from raiding, there were a couple of large cargo ships docked with the station.
"We're dropping speed," Alex said looking at the pilot's display, "beginning our deceleration." He walked over to his chair and tapped the button that allowed him to address the crew.
"All hands, lockdown engineering and evacuate cargo sections of deck one and two." He cut his comm and looked to the sensor readout, their speed had dropped to a quarter of the speed of light.
Jenny looked through the main viewscreen as Grant manually adjusted the optics to get a better view of the station they were approaching, she asked herself whether she thought she would be alive in the next few hours but also wondered how many skulls she would get to crack in the process. She tried her controls every so often, but she had nothing, she was the ship's pilot and had no control. It seemed too good to be true, just trade some cargo and they're free to go, something was wrong here. She used to hunt pirates, a long time ago, she had a stealthy and speedy fighter with jump capability, it had impressive weaponry and could go toe to toe with a battleship, it was agile enough to avoid getting shot, if it did get shot it had enough defence shield for three or four good shots from a battleship. She had seen pirates do this sort of thing before, they would force a random ship to take cargo for them so if they got caught, there's less chance of the pirates being linked to the illicit cargo. It worked most the time as a mixture of childhood stories about pirates and the fact that their crew was being threatened drove fear into Captains and they have no choice but to accept the task.
